With a field of 27 sprint cars on hand, Bacon set fast time in group time trials and then followed that up by winning heat number one from the tail. With an invert of two rows for the feature, Bacon started outside row two in the A Main.

Dustin Morgan, winner of heat three and third fast qualifier, started on the pole and would lead lap one. With one lap in the books, disaster would strike as David Brown flipped violently into the fence on the backstretch. With most eyes on Brown, Morgan slid to a stop in turn one and jumped out of his car on fire. Morgan would suffer burns to his neck , but would later race in the ASCS portion of the evening.

The recipient of Morgan’s bad luck was Austin Alumbaugh, winner of heat two and second quick qualifier for the evening. He restarted at the point and set a torrid pace in Rick Smith’s Engine Connection powered MRP as he was followed by Bacon and Mitchell Moore.

With two laps in the books, John Helm and Taylor Walton made contact in turn two with Helm getting upside down. Helm, who earlier won the B Main, would be finished for the evening.

On the restart, Alumbaugh again shot into the lead as he was followed by Bacon and Moore to complete lap three. Before another lap could be completed, Aaron Kuhn got upside down hard in turn three damaging the catch fence.

After a delay to repair the fence, it was decided that the race would be shortened to fifteen laps.

Once green, Alumbaugh was again followed by Bacon and Moore to complete lap four.

On lap five, Bacon would make his winning pass of Alumbaugh and he would go on to a sizeable win as he scored a special win on the opening night of the Jesse Hockett/Daniel McMillin Memorial. Alumbaugh finished second and extended his point lead over third place Moore with just one race remaining. Casey Shuman was fourth in a second Jack Hockett entry with Eric Todd completing the top five. Kenny Potter and Bob Thoman were sixth and seventh with Steven Cross, Taylor Walton, and Chad Tye completing the top ten.
WAR will again be in action tonight at Lucas Oil Speedway for the second night of the Jesse Hockett/Daniel McMillin Memorial.
Austin Alumbaugh leads Mitchell Moore by thirty four points going into the final points night to become the inaugural WAR champion. Josh Stephens holds a narrow lead over Steven Cross and John Helm for third.